MARK KAPPES WEIGHTLIFTER'S REALISTIC DREAM - OLYMPICS

Mark Kappes sports a T-shirt with a quote by the 19th century German philosopher. It helps him maintain a positive attitude in the face of unbelievable odds.

Kappes is a weightlifter with a realistic dream - the 1988 Olympics. Just six short months ago, however, the 23-year-old ripped a forearm muscle so completely that most people thought he would never compete again.

There was no known operation to mend the ripped muscle. In fact, noted Allentown orthopedic surgeon Dr. Thomas Dickson, Jr. consulted Olympic Weightlifting Team physician Dr. George Seybutz and Boston-area orthopedic surgeon Dr. Burt Zarins, and neither knew of any procedures.

Dickson had to create his own precedent-setting procedure, connecting the severed flexor carpalradialis to the uninjured brachioradialis. No one knew if the surgical procedure could work.

Kappes had the operation on Feb. 14, then left the following week for Florida and a job as a bouncer at a bar on the Fort Lauderdale strip.

Enter motivation in the form of Dave Langworthy, a former member of the U.S. Greco-Roman and Freestyle wrestling teams turned Olympic weightlifter.

Enter confidence, something that had been sadly lacking in Kappes' training routine.

Enter Nietzsche, who emphasized the thirst for power as the grand motivator.

Kappes parlayed his new-found attitude and philosophy into a nice little package last Saturday in Jacksonville, Fla. He won his first Open Class gold medal at the 1986 National Weightlifting Championships.

The 148-pound lifter recorded a clean-and-jerk of 320 pounds for his gold medal, and added a 243-pound snatch to take third place overall in his weight class. His great finish also provided him with a berth in the upcoming National Sports Festival in Houston Texas that runs July 30-Aug. 5.

Kappes' gold medal in the nationals is the first for a Lehigh Valleyweightli fter since his uncle, Bob Bartholomew, did it in 1968. Bartholomew subsequently went on to compete in the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City.

Kappes proudly acknowledged Dickson's role in his outstanding performance.

"He gave me an ultimatum," Kappes said. "If I didn't get the operation, I'd never lift again. He put it very cut-and-dried - never lift again. If I did have the operation, he said all he could guarantee me was a 50/50 chance. It was a very touchy operation."

"There was no way to tell how much good the operation would do," Kappes pointed out. "The main thing was to just repair the tendon. Weightlifting would be an added bonus."

Dickson was coy for the most part about his role, even about successfully designing the experimental surgery.

"What I did was just sew the muscle," Dickson said. "I'll be prefectly frank, I thought Mark Kappes' career was over. I did the best I could, but I didn't think it was going to work.

"Mark has been a national caliber athlete for many years," Dickson pointed out. "There is a certain athlete that never makes it because he gets hurt at the wrong times, and Mark was one of them.

"What I did was nothing. What he's been doing over all the years, putting up with the injuries, the disappointments, all the problems that go with national class athletes, is something.

"His performance makes me look good and I don't deserve it. The surgery was experimental and just happened to work for him, and I stand up and applaud him for his accomplishments."

The last six months have been a learning tree of sorts for Kappes, whose knowledge about his own body and how it operates has slowly branched out into all areas of his life thanks to some new friends.

"I've done better training two months with Dave than I've done inmy whole lifting career," Kappes declared. "And this is after a major operation. I blew away all my bests by a long shot. Dave never let me baby myself about my forearm.

"Before, I had all these negative people around me. How could I improve when people were telling me I wasn't going to be able to do something? People here say, 'Yea, you can do it.'

"This meet put a lot of pressure on me," Kappes said of the nationals. "I had a lot of things to prove. A lot of people said I was through because I had injuries. I'll never give up, not until I make the Olympic team. I missed it in 1984, I've got to make it this time."

Kappes had been using Soviet and Bulgarian lifting programs as patterns, but Langworthy steered him in a new direction.

"I was doing technical exercises from the Bulgarian program," Kappes claimed. "Dave said, 'hey, why do you want to do five or six exercises at 80 percent when you can do just three at 100 percent.' We went back to the basic lifts and squats. All we were doing were clean-and-jerks and snatches and squats for the last two months."

In addition to the training, Kappes ingested "70,000 milligrams of aminos a day." That's amino acids, as in food supplements. Kappes ran up a $100 per week bill over the last three weeks of his training. If his roommate wasn't a distributor, the cost would have been in excess of $250 a week.

Other supplements Kappes relied on were growth hormone releasers (a trio of aminos), branch chain amino acids, and a hard to come by substance called Inosine, which maintains proper nitrogen in the blood, enabling the body to carry oxygen more efficiently.

Despite the supplements and thetraining, it still requires athletic skill to master weightlifting. Ironically, Kappes never competed in scholastic sports.

"It's explosive power that determines if you're good or average," Kappes claimed. "It's not like powerlifting. You have to be an athlete first with weightlifting. It takes a lot of coordination, speed and technique.

"It also takes a lot of inherited ability. If you don't have good genetics, forget it. You'll never be a good weightlifter."

Two days after qualifying for the National Sports Festival, Kappes had gained 14 pounds.

"Pizza and beer at Pizza Hut," he said with a long, hardy laugh. "I'll stay at 148 for the festival, then I'll move up for good, to 165 for the Olympics."

Kappes began his weightlifting career 11 years ago in his father's garage. He is scheduled to be at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Co. from mid-June until the National Sports Festival. Then he's planning a move to Atlanta to train at Coffee's Gym, one of the premier spots for weightlifting in the country.

When Kappes ripped his forearm muscle, it didn't kill him. It helped make him stronger, stronger than ever. It helped him find a whole new attitude and motivation. It may very well help him make the 1988 U.S. Olympic team.